You may have seen some exceptional images of a Nathan Drake cosplayer which have been doing the rounds lately. We thought they were absolutely top notch, and so we tracked down the man himself, and asked him a few questions about his double life as Nathan Drake.

Firstly – can you tell me a little about yourself?

My name is Andrew Aguilar, 23 years old, and I am a man who wears a lot of hats and has an incredible range of hobbies. Gaming, cosplaying, rock-climbing, leatherworking, weightlifting, watching movies are just the hobbies off the top of my head! My day job is currently as an environmental/civil engineer-in-training but I’ve got quite the eclectic employment background.

Do you only cosplay Nate? If so, why him? If not, who else do you ‘do’?

I mainly cosplay Nathan Drake, but he’s not my first, nor my only cosplay. In the past, I’ve done Naked Snake from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, Chris Redfield from Resident Evil 5, and Dr. Alan Grant from Jurassic Park. In the future, I hope to eventually branch out to doing more elaborate costumes like Geralt of Rivia from the Witcher or Monster Hunter.

Why do you cosplay?

I cosplay for a variety of reasons, some more idealistic than others. The main reason that I do it is because I love to act. Being able to dress up as my favourite characters and run around conventions with other people just as excited as me is what keeps me coming back!

Dat chest hair, tho…

Do you do it for particular occasions, or simply for the fun of it?

I do it as often as I can! Whenever there’s a con that I can make it to, you better believe that a Nathan Drake will be there! I’ve dressed up for game launch parties (PS All-Stars, E3, and a couple others), and whenever I go to pick up my own copy of an Uncharted or Metal Gear title ;). But perhaps the most rewarding instance in which I’ve dressed up outside of a con was when I was asked by a friend of mine to appear as Drake at a local YMCA after-school program in costume for a kid’s birthday who absolutely loved Uncharted. His eyes went wide and the first thing he asked me when he gathered the courage was “Where’s Sully?”.

You have Nate’s Uncharted 4 outfit down pretty dang well. How hard is it to put it all together?

I don’t want to undersell how difficult it is to make an elaborate costume from an anime or Blizzard game, but putting together my Uncharted costumes were pretty damn hard! When a more “grounded” costume like Nathan Drake’s is being made- a simple henley, tan jeans, etc, the fine details become the focus. All of a sudden, if the buttons are the wrong colour, if the holster isn’t quite right, then the costume starts to- in my personal opinion- fall flat. It’s what made me start leatherworking, actually! When I saw the full-size Drake poster at E3 2014, I looked at his new holster (of course it’s always a new holster) and said “alright, no cutting corners this time. We do it for real.”

And the attention to detail really shows.

Your cosplay isn’t just about the outfit, though. What processes do you go through to identify the details required?

In order to do UC4 Drake, I took screenshots of the trailer for what Drake’s holster looked like, what it had on it (like that keychain), and how it was put together; careful observation was the name of the game.

As far as mannerisms, poses, and expressions go, repeated playthroughs of the Uncharted series definitely helped haha. Being a climber was also a giant plus- it allowed me to emulate that classic “hanging by one hand and shooting something” look of his that we see.

An investigation into Hollywood make-up led me to some great products that let me add the dirt, water effects, and the cuts to the face. I’m particularly proud of the cuts, actually. I tend to shy away from ego, but there’s something about seeing other good Drake cosplays online that suddenly happen to have the exact cut locations to the brow, cheek and nose bridge that make me smirk.

I notice the quality of your latest photos is very high. Where did you find the photographer?

I moonlight the weekends at a Friendly Local Gaming Store (FLGS), you know, the kind of store that sells board games, wargame miniatures, and Magic the Gather (all of which I play XD). There, I met a friend named Joel Morillo who just so happens to make his living from professional photography. We talked about doing a shoot like this for a while, and just this last weekend, we finally made it happen. We both had a blast and are very happy with the product.

We would like to thank Andrew for taking the time to ‘chat’ to us. Cosplaying is something we haven’t done personally, so it is interesting to get some insight into what is involved from someone who does it so well. 

You can follow Andrew on Twitter here…